by Robin Jarvis
Captain Swazzle finally managed to open the attached picture. The message was from Yikker, who was with the other work party. The Captain squinted at the photo. It showed that same woman whispering to one of the girls, just under an hour ago.
The Captain pushed the whisky into Garrugaska’s hands. Who was that female? What was she up to?
“You!” Swazzle shouted to Charm’s mother. “What you do? Why you talk so much?”
“I’ve got to go,” Mrs Benedict said hurriedly as the Punchinello came stamping over. “Get the wand, find out where my baby is and be out there at eleven! No later. The lorry won’t wait, it’s then or never.”
“Wait, I never!”
“You’ve got to!” she said backing away, across the road to her car. “It’s your only chance. Maybe the world’s only chance! Remember, eleven sharp.”
“Hey, you didn’t say, who’s so desperate to meet me?”
She was already starting the engine and didn’t hear. Reversing sharply, she caused Captain Swazzle to dive out of the way. Then she wound the window down. As the tyres screeched, she yelled, “Yes! She absolutely loves Brazil nuts!”
Lee threw back his head and laughed.
Trying to look absorbed in the work, Spencer sidled over.
“What was that about?” he asked. “Who was she? She looked familiar.”
“That there,” Lee chuckled, slightly bewildered, “was the mother-in-law.”
He spent the rest of the day thinking about her lunatic plan. The more he considered it, the stupider it got. How could it ever be expected to work? There was no way he was going back to Mooncaster to try and steal a fairy godmother’s magic wand. There probably wouldn’t even be a lorry waiting at the junction anyway. Where was Charm’s mother going to get one from and if everyone who wasn’t a Jaxer had been shot, who else was there to drive it? And just where would a lorry head for? There had been checkpoints on all major roads and rigorous controls at every ferry port two months ago. It was probably ten times worse now. He wasn’t going to risk everything for a half-baked idea, born out of desperation and no proper planning.
By seven o’clock that evening, something would have happened that would make him completely change his mind.
When they weren’t busy in the kitchen, Maggie and Esther were obliged to ensure the camp was tidy. They scrubbed the steps of Jangler’s cabin and did his washing. At about five, Maggie was wiping a damp cloth over the windows she could reach. The sun had come out and was gleaming in the clean glass. Reflected in one of the panes, she saw a van arrive. It was the latest consignment of cigars and cigarettes, alcohol, DVDs and sausages for the guards. Even though they were greedy for smokes, liquor and violent movies, they never lost that gleeful enjoyment of sausages.
As with every other delivery, Jangler oversaw the unloading and made a great show of unlocking the fridge. He enjoyed any excuse to rattle the iron hoop of keys that hung at his waist.
“The Jill of Spades has walked free from the Old Bailey,” he told Maggie. “I’ve been watching the trial, broadcast live on the television. What an uproarious circus it was in the courtroom. The princess was dressed in the most audacious fashion and pleaded guilty to every charge. Her contrition and repentance were most heartbreaking. The families of those killed in the Disaster were crowded in the public gallery and heckled the judge and jury to acquit her. They threw ribbons and glitter down then started singing until everyone joined in, including Jill herself and the judge. There are celebrations in the streets this very moment. Astonishing day!”
“Nice for her then,” Maggie muttered.
Jangler clasped his hands in front of his portly stomach.
“I am not unmindful of the distress caused by your friend’s departure this morning,” he said with uncharacteristic empathy. “It now appears to be a tradition here that when one of your number leaves, for whatever reason, I grant you the right to share in the guards’ sausages. The same shall be true of this evening. You may have one sausage each, in memory of your friend and in jubilation at the Jill of Spades’ release.”
“You’re very generous,” Maggie said unconvincingly.
“I’ll get them started!” Esther volunteered. She was too hungry and sick to death of soup to turn her nose up at Jangler’s offer.
The old man smiled indulgently and counted out the required nineteen sausages before locking the fridge once more.
“I hate that old git,” Maggie said when he had gone.
Esther began frying. “Oh, cheer up, Chunky! You’ll be stuffing your face with one of these bangers, same as the rest of us – and be glad of it.”
“I hate you too,” Maggie mouthed at her back.
When the work parties returned, the water jugs, soup and Jangler’s special treat were served as usual in the dining hall. The exhausted children filed in and assumed their customary places. Jody no longer sat at the tables. She preferred to crouch in a corner and eat on her own. Nothing Alasdair could do would persuade her back among the others. She was getting progressively worse.
Lee sat down, surprised to see the extra ration on their plates. He was still thinking about Charm’s mother and her farcical scheme, and was anxious to speak to Maggie about everything that had happened. Suddenly he realised no one was eating. That was odd. They usually tucked in immediately. Then he saw why. The guards had followed them inside.
Normally the Punchinellos left them to it while they went to guzzle their own meals in their cabin. But not tonight. Captain Swazzle paced around the tables, tipping his white fedora back, with his machine gun resting on one high, hunched shoulder while smirking at the others. Yikker was standing in a beam of sunlight that slanted in from a window and clasped his large, strong hands together as if in prayer. His beady eyes flicked over the children’s apprehensive faces. Garrugaska and Bezuel both blew tobacco smoke from their mouths. What were they waiting for?
Maggie came from the kitchen with the last two bowls of soup and set them down. She sat next to Lee and eyed the guards uneasily.
“What is this?” she murmured. “Feeding time at the zoo? They going to start chucking stale buns at us? We should be so lucky.”
“Another long day’s toil over,” Jangler declared as he came striding in. “I just wanted to tell you how pleased I am with your diligence and progress, out there in the minchet orchards.”
“Orchards?” Alasdair snorted under his breath in disbelief.
“A joyous day for us, in this grey dream,” the old man continued. “The Jill of Spades is pronounced innocent and so we shall make merry this night. Please, don’t let your food go cold. Bon appétit!”
“Squassages…” Captain Swazzle cackled. “Lovely, lovely squassages… eat – eat!”
The children returned their attention to the meal. The guards and Jangler did not depart, but their repulsive smiles grew ever wider. What were they doing? Why were they suddenly so interested in watching them eat? It was unnatural and the youngsters were mystified. Tentatively they began. In the corner, Jody bolted the chewy sausage down. Her vegan days were over. She devoured every sweet morsel like a hungry beast and licked her fingers. Then she started on her soup.
Lee pushed his food away. Those big-nosed goons were putting him off. “You should get that down you,” Maggie told him. “The protein will do… ugh!”
Her teeth had crashed into a small nugget of bone. She fished it from her mouth and dropped it on the plate.
“Cheap bangers,” she grumbled.
“Squassages…” Captain Swazzle and the guards chanted. “Sticky, pinky, meaty squassages – yum yum.”
Lee caught an expectant, agitated expression on Jangler’s face. The old guy was psyched about something and was trying to suppress it. Lee had given up second-guessing the lunacy that went on in this place. It truly was an asylum. Everyone was crazy, from Jangler, to the Punchinellos, to Jody and every other inmate, including himself. At least he wasn’t mad enough to take any notice of Mrs Benedict’s moronic
plan. His stomach rumbled and he gave in to it.
A bright gleam of rosy light sparkled across his eyes. It dazzled him and he moved out of its path. Wondering where it came from, he cast his curious gaze down, till it rested on Maggie’s plate. The bone fragment there was bouncing the evening sunshine around, glittering like a…
Lee jolted upright and snatched it up. Wiping it clean, he stared and his mind crashed in horror and disbelief. Behind him, the guards screeched with disgusting laughter and Jangler clapped his hands.
“Little Jack Horner!” he joked.
The Punchinellos hopped up and down, whooping.
Lee spat out the contents of his mouth and retched. Then he went berserk. He hurled the plate to the floor and slammed the table as if he was possessed.
“Stop!” he screamed at everyone. “Stop eating it! Stop! Stop! Dear God! Stop!”
The others stared at him in fear and confusion. He was shivering and gagging and tears were streaming down his face. Unable to say any more, he held up the tiny object in his quaking fingers.
It was a heart-shaped, pink diamanté stud.
Moments later, the dining hall was filled with shrieking children. They ran from the tables, coughing and choking, swilling their mouths with water and spitting it on the floor. Some of them threw up; others forced themselves to do the same.
Maggie lurched from her seat and staggered to the door. She stumbled outside and collapsed on the grass. Lee fell to his knees and howled. His fingernails bit deep into the wood of the table. This couldn’t be real. It couldn’t be happening. Life couldn’t do this to him.
The shrill hilarity of the Punchinellos confirmed everything.
“Wasn’t that a dainty dish!” Jangler sang.
Crouched in the corner, Jody observed the pandemonium, confused and uncertain. Gradually a slow smile tugged the corners of her mouth and she understood. She watched the spluttering girls weep uncontrollably as they hugged one another and saw Alasdair sitting aghast in his chair. Spencer was on the floor, bent double and crying like a baby. Close by, Christina was wailing. The front of her dress reminded Jody of the first day they met.
Jody began to snigger as she recalled something else from that day.
“She was right after all!” she laughed dementedly. “She really does froth on the tongue – ha ha ha!”
Alasdair heard her and covered his shuddering face.
Through watering eyes, Lee glared at Jangler.
“I am gonna kill you!” he swore, lumbering to his feet and rushing at the old man. “You sick son of…”
With a fierce yell, Yikker sprang forward and cracked the boy across the back of the head with a pistol butt.
Blackness roared in Lee’s brain and he fell, unconscious.
Jangler applauded and the four Punchinellos linked arms to skip in a circle.
“Allow them fifteen minutes,” Jangler instructed, nodding at the inconsolable, traumatised children. “Then get them to clear up this mess. Fun’s over – it’s a disgrace in here. Bottles of hard liquor all round for you chaps later.”
The guards swapped arms and danced in the other direction.
Jody crept forward, catlike, towards the tables. She grabbed the gruesome, uneaten food from the plates and crammed it in her mouth like a wild animal. She didn’t waste a crumb.
Alasdair sobbed into his good hand.
LEE WAS OUT cold for the best part of an hour. When he awoke, his head felt like it had been hit with a wrecking ball and there was a lump the size of a potato at the base of his skull. He was still lying on the floor of the dining hall. Sounds of mops, clattering buckets and scraping plates echoed inside his mind. Then he remembered.
Gritting his teeth at the physical and mental pain, he uncurled and sat up. Only one thought burned fiercely. He was going to watch Jangler die, by his own hands.
“Hey,” a voice said gently. “Don’t get up yet. That’s a nasty lump you’ve got.”
Lee twisted round. Maggie was on a chair nearby. Alasdair and Spencer were beside her. They looked pale and ill.
“Where is he?” Lee demanded.
“Jangler’s ootside,” Alasdair said. He couldn’t call that vicious old sadist Mainwaring any more. It was too affectionate a nickname for the likes of him.
“Don’t go out there,” Maggie pleaded. “The guards are drinking. They’re waiting for one of us to flip out and attack the old sod, so they can start shooting.”
“They can shoot me after I’ve torn his head off and kicked it over the wire. I won’t care then. But that’s what I’ve got to do. Don’t you stop me.”
He lifted himself up and shuffled towards the door.
“You can’t even walk!” Maggie told him.
“I’ll manage.”
Spencer ran after him. “This isn’t the way!” he said. “You know what is. If you go out there now, you’re just killing yourself for nothing!”
“Nothing?” Lee growled at him.
“Yes! Nothing. She wouldn’t want you to chuck it in now. You’re angry and want the hurt to stop. I felt the same once, but Marcus talked sense into me. You have to carry on. You have to keep going. You owe it to those who can’t. You owe it to her!”
“Get outta my way, kid.”
“You’ll have to knock me down first. If you go out there and attack Jangler, you’ll be dead in seconds and you’ll have thrown away our one chance of striking back and actually making a difference. You’ve been told what to do, so do it.”
“You’re crazy if you think there’s a hope in hell of that plan working.”
“Yes, I’m crazy. We’re all crazy. There’s nothing sane any more! That’s why it’s got to be worth a go. There’s a real possibility it could work. It’s so stupid it’s brilliant! And that’s the best revenge you’ll ever get. But there’s no hope of anything ever again if you get shot to pieces out there! This isn’t just about you. Stop being so selfish! What happens to us, to the rest of the world? To those girls in her cabin, the ones she asked us to look after? What would she want you to do?”
Lee stared into the younger boy’s eyes. Spencer was frightened, but he was right, dammit. Lee let out a shout of frustration and he kicked the wall. Then, with a phenomenal effort of will, he doused the raw grief that was torching his insides. Ice, he had to be ice. Bury all that rage in an arctic place, deep, deep down. Lock it away until the right time. Here, now, he had to be cold. He had to think.
He closed his eyes and took long breaths. His head was throbbing and his mind was in chaos, but he steered through it.
“OK,” he whispered hoarsely.
Suddenly Mrs Benedict’s plan didn’t seem so laughably stupid. In fact, Spencer was right about that too: it was the only thing that did make sense now.
He put his hand on Spencer’s shoulder and thanked him.
“Let’s do this,” he said grimly. “That’s what she’d want.”
They returned to the others.
“Tonight,” he told them. “We get out of here.”
“What?” Maggie and Alasdair said together.
Lee realised Maggie still knew nothing about last night or meeting Mrs Benedict today. He was about to relate the basic facts when he gave Alasdair a cautious look.
“You still dinnae trust me,” the Scot said, reading him correctly. “Are we no beyond that? I already ken you’re plottin’ on doing a flit somehoo. Tell you what, I’ll leave ye to it. But you wilnae know if I’ve gone straight to Jangler and told on ye till they nab you later.”
Before Lee could answer, out on the lawn, the bell started clanging. Spencer looked out.
“It’s him,” he said. “He’s got the book with him.”
“Time for the last communal reading of the day,” Maggie breathed. “He can’t be serious. After what he just put us through, what he did…”
“The man is criminally deranged,” Alasdair said. “Always was.”
Lee wiped his mouth.
“Come on,” he told them. �
��I’m gonna look that evil pig in the eye one last time. Cos when I get back later, that’s when he’s gonna wish he’d never been born.”
“Back?” Alasdair asked. “Back from where?”
Lee snorted and left the dining hall.
“Don’t let them provoke you,” Spencer warned.
“No danger of that, kid,” he said with a deadly smile. “Right now I’m glacial – I am Jack Frost.”
Jangler and the guards were waiting impatiently. The children came shambling from their cabins and the main block. Charm’s girls were holding hands. They had taken items of her clothing from the suitcases and were wearing them in defiance and remembrance. They had loved her with all their hearts. Esther and her crew lined up sulkily. They were still clutching their stomachs. Esther’s face was graven with shock. Drew and Nicholas felt nauseous; they stared at the ground, trying not to pass out. Jody was at the back. She had almost totally shut down. Only the long habit of obeying the bell’s summons had drawn her out here. She stared emptily into the distance, not seeing the trees. Christina came to stand next to her. The seven-year-old had been washed and changed by one of Charm’s girls.
Lee, Maggie, Spencer and Alasdair were the last to join the assembly.
“Hurry!” Yikker scolded. “In line – in line.”
Lee looked at the guards. They seemed disappointed he wasn’t ranting and raving and lunging at Jangler. He saw their hands twitch over their guns. Yes, Spencer was right, this was a better way. They so wanted to pull those triggers. He could see the resentment on their ugly faces. It was almost painful for them.
“Another charming evening,” Jangler greeted them, emphasising the adjective with callous relish. “For tonight’s text I’ve chosen a delicious passage, concerning the midwinter banquet held in the Great Hall. It contains such vivid imagery of the mouth-watering dishes we are served at Court. I’m certain you’ll savour every word.”
He commenced the reading, rocking backwards and forwards as always. The children began to feel sick again. They couldn’t think of food without heaving. The descriptions of the feast made Esther light-headed and she fainted. Another girl followed and then Nicholas crumpled to the ground.